[boost] Re: Misc library documentation issues

From: Dave Abrahams (abrahams_at_[hidden])
Date: 1999-07-14 07:05:30

>    I would tend to disagree: auto_ptr got broken because simplistic
>    features were added to it -- in terms of design, they introduced more
>    problems than they solved. That this was (and is) the case is simple to
>    demonstrate, which begs the question of why that design went off the
>    rails in the first place (that was rhetorical >:->).

Reasonable people could disagree about this. Personally, I feel the current
auto_ptr design is superior to any of the previous ones (once you figure out
how to implement it - a non-trivial job)!

>    However, returning to the point, the idea of adding a nocount is not
>    really adding a new type of smart ptr at all. It simply allows more
>    flexible use of the library. The introduction of a shared count for 1
>    allows a simple optimisation for a common case, and a resolution of the
>    construction problem (ctors would then never fail).

Why do you think that it's less problematic to have a smart ptr that can
throw when copied and assigned than one that can throw when initially
constructed?

Personally, I find the exception behavior of shared_ptr quite convenient.

-Dave

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